Social kudos

ABSTRACT

A system and method for facilitating rating enterprise personnel or otherwise issuing and tracking indications of approval, e.g., kudos. An example method includes providing a first set of user interface controls adapted to enable plural enterprise personnel to participate in a discussion via electronic communications; providing a first user option for a first participant of the discussion to associate an indication of approval with input provided by a participant of the discussion; providing a second user option to associate a note with the indication of approval; and associating the discussion and the indication of approval with a business object. A social network may provide the first set of user interface controls. The electronic communications include messages exchanged over a social network used to conduct the discussion. The input may include, for example, text and/or a document submitted to participants of the discussion, such as a presentation document.

CROSS REFERENCES TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is related to the following application, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/407,326, entitled SYSTEM FOR PROVIDING GOAL-TRIGGERED FEEDBACK, filed on Feb. 28, 2012, Attorney Docket No. ORACP0044CIP-ORA110293-US-NP-CIP-1, which is hereby incorporated by reference, as if set forth in full in this specification for all purposes.

This application is further related to the following application, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/149,568, entitled UNSOLICITED FEEDBACK ASSOCIATED TO THE PERFORMANCE DOCUMENT, filed on May 31, 2011, Attorney Docket No. ORACP0046-ORAL10295-US-NP, which is hereby incorporated by reference, as if set forth in full in this specification for all purposes.

This application is further related to the following application, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/149,593, entitled LINK FEEDBACK TO PERFORMANCE DOCUMENT CONTENT, filed on May 31, 2011, Attorney Docket No. ORACP0047-ORA1102980-US-NP, which is hereby incorporated by reference, as if set forth in full in this specification for all purposes.

BACKGROUND

The present application relates to software and more specifically to systems and methods for facilitating providing feedback or encouragement between persons of an organization and for facilitating quantifying, measuring, or otherwise ascertaining a person's performance.

Systems and methods for facilitating feedback exchange, such as encouragement, advice, indications of approval (e.g., kudos) or other feedback, are particularly important in enterprise applications, where effective feedback may enhance worker productivity and enterprise profitability. Effective feedback may help organizations maximize workforce knowledge, skill, and talent. Feedback may also facilitate ascertaining worker performance and may enable enterprises to make informed decisions about worker compensation, rewards, job assignments, and so on.

Conventionally, an enterprise may conduct annual or bi-annual performance reviews and provide limited feedback to workers based on the reviews. The performance review process may require managers to review worker performance in view of predefined objectives. A manager may solicit feedback, e.g., via emailed forms and questionnaires, from certain persons who have interacted with a worker being reviewed during the review period.

However, such feedback is often incomplete and based on potentially questionable recollections or general impressions of worker performance. Furthermore, the review process and feedback collection is often undesirably time consuming for reviewers, such as managers. Furthermore, limited bi-annual or annual feedback may be relatively untimely. Relevant feedback that may improve worker performance may be withheld until the next review period.

SUMMARY

An example method for facilitating rating enterprise personnel or otherwise issuing and tracking kudos or other indications of approval includes providing a first set of user interface controls adapted to enable plural enterprise personnel to participate in a discussion via electronic communications; providing a first user option for a first participant of the discussion to associate an indication of approval, e.g., a kudos, with input provided by a participant of the discussion; providing a second user option to associate a note with the indication of approval; and associating the discussion and the indication of approval with a business object, such as in response to user selection of a third user option.

In an illustrative embodiment, the example method further includes employing a social network to provide the first set of user interface controls. The electronic communications include messages exchanged over a social network used to conduct the discussion, i.e., conversation. The input may include, for example, text and/or a document submitted to participants of the discussion, such as a presentation document.

The one or more user interface controls includes a toggle for turning on or off display of indications of approval for one or more participants in the discussion. A fourth user option enables a user to associate a second indication of approval with a group of enterprise personnel and the discussion.

The example method further includes collecting one or more indications of approval for a participant of the discussion and making a resulting collection of one or more indications accessible via a performance review document. The collection is also accessible via a social network profile of the participant.

A fifth user option enables enterprise personnel to associate a third indication of approval with a participant of the social network at a profile of the participant. A sixth user option enables certain enterprise personnel to view one or more statistics pertaining to indications of approval that have been associated with the participant.

One of the first set of user interface controls, which appears in a user interface display screen used during the discussion, provides a seventh user option to view one or more statistics pertaining to one or more indications of approval associated with a participant of the discussion. Example statistics include a number of indications of approval received by a participant of the discussion during a time interval, and an indication of one or more enterprise personnel who have received more indications of approval than other enterprise personnel.

An eighth user option enables display of information pertaining to the business object. A ninth user option enables association of a portion of text occurring in an electronic message with an indication of approval and with the discussion.

A tenth user option enables access to a performance review document pertaining to one or more enterprise personnel. One or more user interface controls in the performance review document may facilitate displaying a conversation associated with one or more indications of approval. Another user interface control in the performance review document may facilitate navigating to a user interface display screen that is adapted to illustrate data of a business object with which an indication of approval is associated.

Hence, certain embodiments discussed herein facilitate exchange of timely informal positive feedback, such as between coworkers collaborating on a goal, opportunity, or other project represented by a business object. Managers need not be involved in such feedback exchange, and workers and coworkers need not leave their current applications or business processes to exchange informal positive feedback, e.g., kudos. Functionality for issuing and tracking kudos may foster increased trust and collaboration via a social network and may enhance performance evaluation processes, e.g., by providing rich content and minimizing managerial and reviewer work load during the review process. Furthermore, enterprise personnel, e.g., workers, may incrementally benefit from timely feedback and need not wait for the completion of a review process to act upon important feedback, which could improve worker performance and overall enterprise productivity.

A further understanding of the nature and the advantages of particular embodiments disclosed herein may be realized by reference of the remaining portions of the specification and the attached drawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating an example enterprise computing environment and accompanying system for facilitating allocating, tracking, and compiling statistics pertaining to kudos and associated feedback between enterprise personnel, such as coworkers.

FIG. 2 shows a first example user interface display screen pertaining to a business object and illustrating text of a first discussion occurring via a first social network and showing a user option to associate the discussion with a business object.

FIG. 3 shows a second example user interface display screen illustrating text of a second discussion occurring via a social network and further illustrating user interface controls for providing discussion input and assigning kudos to input provided by discussion participants.

FIG. 4 shows a third example user interface display screen illustrating an example dialog for selecting individuals or groups for assigning kudos thereto.

FIG. 5 shows a fifth example user interface display screen illustrating an example representation of a profile of an enterprise employee and a kudos user interface control for enabling viewers of the profile to view kudos associated with the employee.

FIG. 6 shows a sixth example user interface display screen illustrating user interface controls for allocating a kudos via an email client plugin.

FIG. 7 shows a seventh example user interface display screen illustrating an example performance review document with collected kudos and user interface controls for navigating to a user interface display screen for viewing details of a business object associated with a kudos and for navigating to a user interface display screen for viewing details of a conversation associated with a kudos.

FIG. 8 is a flow diagram of an example method adapted for use with the embodiments of FIGS. 1-7.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS

For the purposes of the present discussion, an enterprise may be any organization of persons, such as a business, university, government, military, and so on. The terms “organization” and “enterprise” are employed interchangeably herein. Personnel of an organization or enterprise, i.e., enterprise personnel, may include any persons associated with the organization, such as employees, contractors, board members, and so on.

ERP software may be any set of computer code that is adapted to facilitate managing resources of an organization. Example resources include Human Resources (HR), financial resources, assets, employees, and so on, of an enterprise. The terms “ERP software” and “ERP application” may be employed interchangeably herein. However, an ERP application may include one or more ERP software modules or components, such as user interface software modules or components.

For clarity, certain well-known components, such as hard drives, processors, operating systems, power supplies, the Internet, other networks, and so on, have been omitted from the figures. However, those skilled in the art with access to the present teachings will know which components to implement and how to implement them to meet the needs of a given application.

FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating an example enterprise computing environment and accompanying system 10 for facilitating allocating, tracking, and compiling statistics pertaining to kudos and associated feedback between enterprise personnel, such as coworkers.

For the purposes of the present discussion, a kudos may be any indication of approval. A kudos may be represented via an icon or other user interface feature and may include a note, such as text representing feedback and/or a note explaining why the kudos has been given. A kudos may represent a object, which itself may be associated with another object, such as a business object. The term “kudos” may be both singular and plural.

For the purposes of the present discussion, an object, such as a data object, may be any grouping of or encapsulation of data and/or functionality. Examples of objects include classes or structures implemented via object-oriented programming languages; tables, rows, or records of a database; and so on. A representation of an object, i.e., a displayed object, may be displayed via graphical depiction, such as a node of a tree diagram, a menu item, dialog box, personnel icon, an entire user interface display screen, and so on. The graphical depiction of an object may also be called an object, a displayed object, or a node.

A business object may be any object used to organize information for business purposes. An example business object may be formed by creating a name for the business object, such as “CRM Opportunity 1” or “Goal 1” and then associating information with the name. For example, “CRM Opportunity 1” object may be associated with a conversation, one or more enterprise personnel, one or more kudos assigned to a team that is associated with the object, and so on. Data that is associated with a business object may be contained within a data structure or database associated with the object, or the information may be distributed among different applications, computers, and so on, without departing from the scope of the present teachings.

The example system 10 includes a social network 12, which may include various social networking websites, business social networks (also called enterprise social networks), and other software and systems adapted to enable conversations or collaboration between individuals. For the purposes of the present discussion, a conversation may be any communication exchange between two or more persons. A conversation may include text and/or other input, such as uploaded or shared presentations, documents, audio files, or other files. The terms “conversation” and “discussion” are employed interchangeably herein.

Various ERP software applications 14-22 may communicate with the social network 12 to retrieve, access, and/or interchange content. In the present example embodiment a social kudos controller 24 interfaces the various ERP software applications 14-22 and is adapted to facilitate interchange of information pertaining to kudos, associated conversations, and associated business objects, between the various ERP software applications 14-22 and the social network 12.

In the present example embodiment, the social network 12 includes computer code for hosting various conversations 26-30 pertaining to different business objects and for hosting different social profiles 32 of enterprise personnel.

The example social network 12 includes a business object conversation 26, which may be hosted via software that includes functionality (e.g., a conversation social kudos creation module 34), for enabling participants in the business object conversation 26 to give or allocate kudos to other participants in the conversation 26. The business object corresponding to the business object conversation 26 may be any type of business object, such as other business object 52 of the other ERP software application 14.

The example goal object conversation 28 is hosted by software that is adapted to enable conversation about a goal business object and to enable goal conversation social kudos creation 36. Similarly, the example opportunity object conversation module 30 is hosted by software that is adapted to enable conversation about an opportunity goal business object and to enable opportunity conversation social kudos creation 38.

The social profiles 32 may each include functionality 42 for facilitating collecting and displaying social kudos and associated statistics for a given profile of a worker or other enterprise personnel. A profile social kudos creation module 40 includes computer code for enabling profile visitors to create or otherwise allocate kudos to a worker profile 32. When a worker gives or allocates a kudos for a coworker via a coworker's social profile, the worker is said to leave a social kudos for the coworker on the coworker's social profile.

Each of the example kudos created via the kudos creation modules 34-40 and accompanying business object conversations or profiles 26-32 may be associated with business objects that may contain additional data. For example the business object conversation 26 and associated kudos may be associated with the other business object 52; the goal object conversation 28 may be associated with HCM Goal business object 56 maintained by a HCM module 18; the opportunity object conversation 30 may be associated with a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) business object 54 maintained by an CRM system 16, and so on.

Information pertaining to associations between business objects, kudos, and conversations may be maintained via the social kudos controller 24, e.g., via a business object associations module 44, and/or via one or more other modules in the system 10. The example social kudos controller 34 further includes a social conversation collection and tracking module 46, a social kudos collection module 50, and a kudos statistics generator 48, which may intercommunicate. The social kudos collection module 50 may collect copies of kudos when they are issued via the social network 12 and other ERP software 14-18. Similarly, the social conversation collection and tracking module 46 may store text and other input pertaining to conversations occurring via the social network 12 and other ERP software 14-18.

The kudos statistics generator 48 may access the social kudos collection 50 and the social conversation and tracking module 46, with reference to associations (e.g., associations between social kudos, conversations, and business objects) maintained by the business object associations module 44, to generate kudos statistics, such as counts of numbers of kudos for different workers during a particular time interval, rankings of enterprise personnel based on kudos, counts of numbers of kudos received by a participant in a conversation during the conversation, counts of numbers of kudos enterprise personnel receive via the social network profile 32, measurements or indications of enterprise personnel who have received the most kudos or kudos beyond a predetermined threshold amount, and so on.

The social kudos collection 50 and associated social kudos statistics output by the kudos statistics generator 48 may be accessible to various modules and software applications of the system 10, such as a social kudos collection and statistics viewing module 42 employed at the social profiles 32, a social kudos collection and statistics viewing module 64 available at a talent profile 60 maintained via the HCM software 18, and to a performance document 58 and accompanying social kudos collection and statistics viewing module 62. The social kudos collection statistics and viewing modules 42, 62, 64 may include computer code for retrieving information and statistics about kudos from the social kudos controller 24, e.g., via the social kudos collection module 50 and kudos statistics generator 48.

Accordingly, the HCM software 18 and social network 12 and accompanying software include computer code for displaying kudos and statistics, i.e., for making kudos and associated statistics for enterprise personnel viewable by a manager, a participant in a discussion (e.g., a coworker of a worker), and other members of the social network 12 or authorized users of the ERP software 14-18.

An optional email client (e.g., Microsoft Outlook®) plugin 22 may communicate with the social kudos controller 24. In the present example embodiment, the email client plugin 22 includes computer code for enabling a user to select text from an email message for inclusion in a new kudos or preexisting kudos and to allocate a kudos to a recipient or sender of an email message associated with the text.

A system administrator module 20 communicates with the social kudos controller 24 and includes computer code for providing administrator user options to enable or disable kudos functionality of the system 10, such as functionality for toggling display of kudos in the social network 12 and other ERP software modules 14-18. The social kudos controller 24 includes computer code responsive to input from the system administrator module 20 and accompanying user interface to effect enabling or disabling of kudos functionality. The system administrator module 20 may further include computer code for verifying security credentials or other authentication requirements to ensure that only authorized administrators can access functionality provided via the system administrator module 20.

Hence, kudos and associated conversations, statistics, and other business object data may be mined from various locations and software applications of the system 10 via the social kudos controller 24 interface. Information about the mined kudos is then displayable via various modules, such as via the performance document 58 and talent profile 60 of the HCM software 18, via the social profiles 32 of the social network 12, and via the business object conversation modules 26-30. Note that the business object conversation modules 26-30 may include functionality for enabling conversation participants to access kudos received by participants in the conversation. Note that the business object conversation modules 26-30 may locally store kudos information pertaining to a given conversation and/or may retrieve kudos information from the social kudos controller 24.

For the purposes of the present discussion, a performance document, also called a performance review document, a performance report, or a performance evaluation document, may be any document adapted to specifically contain or reference information pertaining to the performance and/or behavior of an employee or other enterprise personal over a predetermined time interval. A document may be any collection of information, which may include one or more virtual files (as opposed to a printed hard copy of a file) and/or computing objects. A document need not be represented as a single file, but may include, for example, files linked together and accessible via a common interface, such as via an HyperText Markup Language (HTML) web page or file.

Note that certain modules of the system 10 may combined into a single module, separated into plural modules, or distributed across a network, without departing from the scope of the present teachings. For example, the business object conversation modules 26-30 may be implemented via a single module or software application, which may run on a server or may be distributed across client devices and/or servers coupled to a network, such as the Internet.

Hence, the system 10 enables users to create conversations that are associated with a business object, such as a CRM opportunity object. Users who are collaborating on the business object may document their input, such as uploaded presentations or other documents, to the conversation. For example, sales representatives may collaborate on a sales opportunity and document their discussion in the ‘conversation’ that is associated with the business object. Users may also navigate to a profile (“Portrait”) (e.g., social profile 32) of another user and leave “Kudos” for that user. Previously created kudos may be displayed in an employee's performance document (e.g., the performance document 58).

FIG. 2 shows a first example user interface display screen 70 pertaining to an opportunity business object 78 (called Digital Imaging Replacement) and illustrating user interface controls 74 for accessing various discussions and kudos associated with the business object 78.

The user interface display screen 70 includes a business object summary 68, with various information, such as primary contact, business object name, revenue, and so on. An example listing of documented conversations 72 is positioned in a lower left section of the display screen 70. The various conversations 72 are called social conversations that may be implemented via a social network component. For example, the user interface display screen 70 may correspond to the business object 54 of FIG. 1. The social conversations 72 are associated with the identified business object 78 and may correspond to the opportunity conversation 30 of FIG. 1.

Various user interface controls 74 enable users, e.g., authorized workers or other enterprise personnel, to begin a new conversation; expand or open listed conversations, search for conversations, and so on. Selection of a first kudos user interface control 76 may trigger display of another user interface display screen, whereby a user may enable, use, or otherwise activate kudos functionality. For example, user interface controls may enable showing or hiding display of kudos indications, e.g., indications of approval associated with each of the conversations 72; enable users to enter notes to be combined with or otherwise associated with a kudos enable users to trigger display of kudos for an entire conversation and/or for individual participants in a conversation, and so on.

A kudos may be represented via a symbol, as discussed more fully below. Alternatively, or in addition, a kudos may be represented by a message, such as a note indicating positive or complimentary feedback. In certain example embodiments discussed herein, a kudos is considered as including an indication of approval, such as represented by a special symbol or count, and a note pertaining to the indication of approval.

FIG. 3 shows a second example user interface display screen 80 illustrating text of a second discussion 82 occurring via a social network (such as the social network 12 of FIG. 1) and further illustrating user interface controls 86 for providing discussion input and assigning kudos to input provided by discussion participants.

In the present example embodiment, a message representing conversation input is selected by a user, such as participant Jules Hendersen. A kudos user option, i.e., user interface control 88, may then be selected by Jules Hendersen to facilitate adding a kudos for Nicole Kelly based on or associated with the selected input 84 of Nicole Kelly. A note field 96 enables the kudos giver, e.g., Jules Hendersen, to add a note to be further associated with or included in the kudos. After a kudos note, e.g., text pertaining to positive feedback, has been entered, and the kudos control 88 is selected, the kudos is registered as being associated with Nicole Kelly's input 84 in the conversation 82, which is associated with a business object, e.g., Pinnacle Green Server ROI 98.

An optional user option 90 is adapted to facilitating associating additional business objects with the discussion 82 and accompanying kudos. A kudos toggle user interface control 94 in a section 92 adjacent to the conversation 82 enables toggling on and off the kudos user interface control 88 of the user interface controls 86.

Note that in certain implementations, a kudos icon or other indication may appear inline with text 84 or other input, such as presentations uploaded to a conversation pertaining to a business object. Note that kudos may be viewable by and given by participants in a conversation to other participants, thereby resulting in coworker feedback exchange. Such feedback is not limited to managers giving subordinates feedback.

Note that while in the present example embodiment, Nicole Kelly's entire message 84 is selected for inclusion with a kudos, a portion of the text of the input 84 or just an attached presentation may be selected for the kudos.

FIG. 4 shows a third example user interface display screen 100 illustrating an example dialog for selecting individuals 104 or groups 102 for assigning kudos thereto. In certain implementations, the user interface display screen 100 may appear in response to selecting the kudos icon 88 of FIG. 3 when no conversation text has been highlighted or selected. Alternatively, an additional kudos user interface control may be provided in FIG. 3 to trigger display of the third example user interface display screen 100 of FIG. 4.

When a user has selected a group 102 and/or individual 104, the selected group or individual may be transferred, e.g., via a transfer control 108, to a kudos recipient section 106, which lists persons and/or groups who are to receive a kudos. Similarly, persons in the kudos recipient section 106 may be selectively removed from the kudos recipient section 106 via the transfer control 108.

After kudos recipients are selected, a save and allocate kudos button 110 may be selected to register or associate a kudos with the kudos recipients 106. The allocated kudos may include kudos text entered in the field 96 of FIG. 3. Alternatively, an additional user interface display screen may be provided in response to selection of the save and allocate kudos button 110, whereby a user may customize individual kudos for each of the kudos recipients 106.

Hence, user options are provided to enable selection of multiple workers for simultaneous kudos allocation. Allocated kudos are distributed to each member of a selected group, and corresponding kudos may appear in a performance evaluation document for each kudos recipient.

FIG. 5 shows a fifth example user interface display screen 120 illustrating an example representation of a profile 122 of an enterprise employee, e.g., Ravi Cho, and a kudos user interface control 132 for enabling viewers of the profile 122 to view kudos associated with the employee.

Upon selection of the display kudos button 132, which may act as a toggle, a kudos section 124 appears. The kudos section 124 includes a kudos statistics graph 130. The kudos graph 130 may indicate, for example, numbers of kudos acquired by Ravi Cho during a given time interval, along with average numbers of kudos acquired by Ravi Cho's team or other group of enterprise personnel. The display of the kudos statistics graph 130 may be toggled by user selection of a kudos statistics control 136.

Selection of an optional configure kudos statistics button 138 may trigger display of an additional user interface display screen for configuring how kudos statistics are displayed and what statistics information is displayed.

An add kudos button 134 represents a user option for enabling visitors to the profile 122 to add kudos to Ravi Cho's list of kudos 128. Kudos are denoted as kudos via optional kudos symbols 142 or icons adjacent to text included with or associated with each kudos of the kudos list 128.

A kudos may include a business object link 140, selection of which may enable navigation from the profile 122 to a user interface display screen (e.g., the user interface display screen 70 of FIG. 2) depicting additional information about the business object.

Hence, enterprise personnel that are not part of a particular discussion may browse to profile of coworker, such as the profile 122 or the profiles 32 or 60 of FIG. 1, to submit kudos and view accompanying kudos statistics.

FIG. 6 shows a sixth example user interface display screen 150 illustrating user interface features 156, 158 that facilitate allocating a kudos via an email client plugin. The example user interface display screen 150 includes a listing of email messages 152 adjacent to a kudos plugin window 154.

For the purposes of the present discussion, a user interface control may be any user interface feature that is adapted to enable a user to trigger or otherwise use functionality associated with or provided by the user interface. Accordingly, a mechanism for selecting conversation text 156 may represent a type of user interface control, as the term is used herein.

In an example operative scenario, a user selects text from one of the messages 152, resulting in selected text 156. A kudos button 158 in the kudos plugin window 154 may then be selected to trigger display of another user interface display screen for registering a kudos in association with the selected text 156; associating the kudos with a business object and/or conversation; and entering any additional note to be associated with the kudos. Hence, text may be selected from an email and added to an existing conversation, and text may be tagged for including in a kudos.

FIG. 7 shows a seventh example user interface display screen 170 illustrating an example performance review document 172 with collected kudos 174 and a first navigation user interface control 176. The first navigation user interface control 176 represents a user option to navigate to a user interface display screen for viewing details of a business object associated with a kudos. A second navigation control 178 represents a user option to navigate to a user interface display screen for viewing details of a conversation associated with a kudos. In the present example embodiment, the kudos 174 are associated with an opportunity business object, e.g., Pinnacle Opportunity 176.

Note that one or more of the kudos 174 may be associated with a conversation. In this case, selection of the second navigation control 178, which may appear adjacent to a kudos, may trigger navigation away from the performance evaluation document 172 and to a user interface display screen that illustrates the conversation that is associated with the kudos that is adjacent to or in proximity to the second navigation control 178.

In summary, managers viewing the performance evaluation user interface display screen 170 have options to view information about business object underlying a conversation for which a worker has received a kudos (subject to manager authentication status, i.e., security); to then view a presentation or other input to which the kudos is responsive, and so on. If a manager lacks access credentials to view an underlying conversation, the manager may nevertheless view the kudos 174.

Furthermore, kudos statistics pertaining to the subject of the performance evaluation document 172 may be accessed, e.g., by an authorized manager or Human Resources (HR) reviewer, by selecting a kudos statistics control 180. The kudos statistics may illustrate the number of kudos received by the subject of the performance evaluation document 172 within a given time interval; indications as to who received the most kudos during the time interval, and so on.

Exact types of statistics that are tracked and calculated are implementation specific and may vary, without departing from the scope of the present teachings.

FIG. 8 is a flow diagram of an example method 190 adapted for use with the embodiments of FIGS. 1-7. The example method 190 includes a first step 192, which involves providing a first set of user interface controls adapted to enable plural enterprise personnel to participate in a discussion, i.e., conversation, via electronic communications.

A second step 194 includes providing a first user option for a first participant of the discussion to associate an indication of approval with input provided by a participant of the discussion.

A third step 196 includes providing a second user option to associate a note with the indication of approval.

A fourth step 198 includes providing a third user option to associate the discussion and the indication of approval with a business object.

Note that method 190 may be modified, without departing from the scope of the present teachings. For example various steps may be added to, removed from, or substituted into the method 190. An example additional step includes employing a social network to provide the first set of user interface controls. The electronic communications include messages exchanged over a social network used to conduct the discussion. Another example step includes enabling a system administrator to enable or disable kudos functionality in an ERP system.

Although the description has been described with respect to particular embodiments thereof, these particular embodiments are merely illustrative, and not restrictive.

For example, while the present application is discussed with respect to systems and methods for enabling kudos to be exchanged between participants in a social network conversation while participating the conversation; by visiting a social network profile; or by employing kudos functionality of an email client plugin, embodiments are not limited thereto. For example, kudos functionality may be added to virtually any collaborative software or applications that can retrieve content from the Internet or other network. Hence, various example web conferencing applications may be augmented with kudos functionality as discussed herein, without departing from the scope of the present teachings.

Any suitable programming language can be used to implement the routines of particular embodiments including C, C++, Java, assembly language, etc. Different programming techniques can be employed such as procedural or object oriented. The routines can execute on a single processing device or multiple processors. Although the steps, operations, or computations may be presented in a specific order, this order may be changed in different particular embodiments. In some particular embodiments, multiple steps shown as sequential in this specification can be performed at the same time.

Particular embodiments may be implemented in a computer-readable storage medium for use by or in connection with the instruction execution system, apparatus, system, or device. Particular embodiments can be implemented in the form of control logic in software or hardware or a combination of both. The control logic, when executed by one or more processors, may be operable to perform that which is described in particular embodiments.

Particular embodiments may be implemented by using a programmed general purpose digital computer, by using application specific integrated circuits, programmable logic devices, field programmable gate arrays, optical, chemical, biological, quantum or nanoengineered systems, components and mechanisms may be used. In general, the functions of particular embodiments can be achieved by any means as is known in the art. Distributed, networked systems, components, and/or circuits can be used. Communication, or transfer, of data may be wired, wireless, or by any other means.

It will also be appreciated that one or more of the elements depicted in the drawings/figures can also be implemented in a more separated or integrated manner, or even removed or rendered as inoperable in certain cases, as is useful in accordance with a particular application. It is also within the spirit and scope to implement a program or code that can be stored in a machine-readable medium to permit a computer to perform any of the methods described above.

As used in the description herein and throughout the claims that follow, “a”, “an”, and “the” includes plural references unless the context clearly dictates otherwise. Also, as used in the description herein and throughout the claims that follow, the meaning of “in” includes “in” and “on” unless the context clearly dictates otherwise.

Thus, while particular embodiments have been described herein, latitudes of modification, various changes, and substitutions are intended in the foregoing disclosures, and it will be appreciated that in some instances some features of particular embodiments will be employed without a corresponding use of other features without departing from the scope and spirit as set forth. Therefore, many modifications may be made to adapt a particular situation or material to the essential scope and spirit. 

We claim:
 1. A method for facilitating rating enterprise personnel, the method comprising: providing a first set of user interface controls adapted to enable plural enterprise personnel to participate in a discussion via electronic communications; providing a first user option for a first participant of the discussion to associate an indication of approval with input provided by a participant of the discussion; providing a second user option to associate a note with the indication of approval; and providing a third user option to associate the discussion and the indication of approval with a business object.
 2. The method of claim 1, further including employing a social network to provide the first set of user interface controls, and wherein the electronic communications include messages exchanged over a social network used to conduct the discussion.
 3. The method of claim 2, wherein the input includes a document submitted to participants of the discussion.
 4. The method of claim 2, wherein the one or more user interface controls includes a toggle for turning on or off display of indications of approval for one or more participants in the discussion.
 5. The method of claim 1, further including providing a fourth user option to associate a second indication of approval with a group of enterprise personnel and the discussion.
 6. The method of claim 1, further including collecting one or more indications of approval for a participant of the discussion and making a resulting collection of one or more indications accessible via a performance review document.
 7. The method of claim 6, further including providing the collection to a profile of the participant, wherein the profile is maintained and accessible via a social network.
 8. The method of claim 6, further including providing a fifth user option, via the social network, for enterprise personnel to associate a third indication of approval with a participant of the social network at a profile of the participant.
 9. The method of claim 8, further including providing a sixth user option, via the profile, for enterprise personnel to view one or more statistics pertaining to indications of approval that have been associated with the participant.
 10. The method of claim 1, further providing a seventh user option, via a user interface control that is included among the first set of user interface controls and appearing in a user interface display screen used during the discussion, to view one or more statistics pertaining to one or more indications of approval associated with a participant of the discussion.
 11. The method of claim 10, wherein the one or more statistics include a number of indications of approval received by a participant of the discussion during a time interval.
 12. The method of claim 10, wherein the one or more statistics include an indication of one or more enterprise personnel who have received more indications of approval than other enterprise personnel.
 13. The method of claim 12, further including making the statistics viewable by a manager of a participant in the discussion.
 14. The method of claim 1, further including providing an eighth user option to display information pertaining to the business object.
 15. The method of claim 1, further including providing a ninth user option to associate a portion of text occurring in an electronic message with an indication of approval and with the discussion.
 16. The method of claim 1, further including providing a tenth user option to access a performance review document pertaining to one or more enterprise personnel.
 17. The method of claim 16, further including providing one or more user interface controls in the performance review document for facilitating displaying a conversation associated with one or more indications of approval.
 18. The method of claim 16, further including providing one or more user interface controls in the performance review document for facilitating navigating to a user interface display screen that is adapted to illustrate data of a business object with which an indication of approval is associated.
 19. An apparatus comprising: a digital processor coupled to a display and to a processor-readable storage device, wherein the processor-readable storage device includes one or more instructions executable by the digital processor to perform the following acts: providing a first set of user interface controls adapted to enable plural enterprise personnel to participate in a discussion via electronic communications; providing a first user option for a first participant of the discussion to associate an indication of approval with input provided by a participant of the discussion; providing a second user option to associate a note with the indication of approval; and providing a third user option to associate the discussion and the indication of approval with a business object.
 20. A processor-readable storage device including instructions executable by a digital processor, the processor-readable storage device including one or more instructions for: providing a first set of user interface controls adapted to enable plural enterprise personnel to participate in a discussion via electronic communications; providing a first user option for a first participant of the discussion to associate an indication of approval with input provided by a participant of the discussion; providing a second user option to associate a note with the indication of approval; and providing a third user option to associate the discussion and the indication of approval with a business object. 